I was born of two parents who just barely received their college diplomas. It took my dad eight years to complete his education at Syracuse University in the 60s, departing halfway through to volunteer as a medic in the army during the Vietnam war. My mom moved to New York from California at 20 years old with nothing but sixty dollars in cash and managed to pay her way through New York University by waiting tables in Times Square. Despite their many struggles as young people, they became a successful businessman and high school librarian, respectively, and raised a daughter in New York's suburbia who spent her young life attending fantastic public schools and playing on various town sports teams - a relatively normal childhood compared to her parents' struggles. However, as a relatively apathetic teen, Senator Barack Obama's campaign for change took hold early on in the primary season of 2007, when I was a junior in high school. Complaining of seemingly \"irrelevant\" courses and receiving poor grades out of pure teen angst, the Obama campaign sparked a part of me that sought a larger purpose and I spent many weekends for the next year making phone calls and knocking on doors, enlisting the help of my peers, to get Senator Obama elected as president of the United States. While Barack Obama's victory was an incredible moment in our nation's history, and probably my fondest memory of senior year of high school, I would have taken something away from that grassroots campaign whether he'd won or lost. As a seventeen-year-old, not even able to vote, I had a seat at the table and a voice in a campaign that empowered me to become a more engaged citizen and a strong believer in the American Dream, not only because of my parents' experience, but because of my own.